The Perdue Chicken Cookbook | Page 9

it was kind of flat and tasteless. I remember wondering if
this was what cotton tasted like - although to be fair, it wasn't really
that bad. Why are bones sometimes dark? Darkened bones occur when
the product has been frozen. Freezing causes the blood cells in the bone
marrow to rupture and then when the chicken is thawed, these ruptured
cells leak out and cause visible reddish splotches on the bones. When
cooked, these discolorations will turn from red to almost black. Is it
true that breast meat is the least fattening part of a chicken? Yes. Breast
meat has about half the fat of thigh meat. If calories or cholesterol are
important to you, choose the breast meat. Frank watches his cholesterol
and I've never seen him go for anything but breast meat. Is it better to
cook a chicken quickly at a high temperature-or slowly at a low
temperature? Both work, but with high temperatures, you run a greater
risk of uneven cooking, with the wings and legs becoming overcooked
before the rest of the bird is done. Usually we recommend a moderate
temperature of 350 degrees for whole birds and 375 degrees for parts. If
you are in a hurry and want to use a higher temperature, then shield the
wings and legs by wrapping them with aluminum foil if they're starting
to become too brown. How much should I allow for shrinkage when
cooking chicken? For each 3-ounce serving of cooked poultry, buy an
extra ounce to allow for shrinkage and an extra two ounces to allow for
bone. If I want to use different parts of the chicken from what the
recipe calls for, how do I go about making substitutions? This table
should help: Name of Part Approximate No. to Equal One Whole
Chicken Whole breasts 3 Half breasts 6 Whole leg (thigh and
drumstick) 6 Thigh 12 Drumsticks 14 Wing 14 Drumette (upper part of

wing) 24 When using cooked chicken, allow one pound of whole
uncooked chicken for each cup of cooked, edible chicken meat. How
do you truss a chicken? HERE HAVE ILLUSTRATION SHOWING
HOW
What's the best way to carve a chicken? HERE HAVE
ILLUSTRATION SHOWING HOW
Some of your recipes call for roasters. I don't live in an area where
Perdue chicken is sold, and I haven't been able to find roasters in the
stores. What exactly is a roaster, and can I substitute a broiler? A
Perdue Oven Stuffer Roaster is a 12 week old bird especially developed
for a broad breast. Roasters are bigger than broilers, and have a more
favorable meat to bone ratio than broilers. Because they are older birds,
they also have a much deeper, richer flavor. You can use broilers in
roaster recipes, but plan on the chicken's being done sooner and having
a noticeably milder flavor. Frank, by the way, is the man responsible
for creating the roaster market. Back in the early 1970s, when few
people had ever heard of a roaster, he was the one who worked to breed
these broad-breasted birds, and who put the effort into advertising so
people would learn about the new product. He surprised his colleagues
by how determined he was in his developing and marketing efforts.
One of the men who worked with Frank told me that he was amazed
that Frank, who will hang onto an old pair of shoes to save $50, was
willing to spend millions to let people know about the product, and
further, he did it without a qualm, because he had such belief in it. If
you haven't tried an Oven Stuffer Roaster and you're visiting the East
Coast, try one, and you'll see why Frank believed in it so much.


Chapter One
: CHICKEN FOR EVERYDAY
Napoleon's cook once bet that he could cook chicken a different way
every day of the year. The cook found that this was an easy bet to win,
and I can see why, having looked at the recipes in Frank's files.
Chicken's versatility seems almost endless. Perdue Farms home
economists have been developing chicken recipes since the early 1970s
and as a result, Frank has more than 2000 chicken recipes. If only

Napoleon had chosen to bet with me, I could have won even if he'd said
the bet was for six years! In this chapter, you'll find some of Frank's
and my favorites for every day cooking. But there are different kinds of
every day cooking, so I've divided the chapter into three sections to
take care of three different every day situations. The first section, Fast
Food Chicken from Your Refrigerator, is for when you're in a hurry
and want dinner on the table in the shortest possible time. None of
these recipes takes more than 15 minutes,